Verizon: Level 3's Net-Neutrality Charge Against Comcast is Specious

Verizon Communications is siding with Comcast in
urging the Federal Communications Commission stay out of the MSO's dispute with
Level 3 Communications over Internet interconnection fees, saying the standoff
is decidedly not about network neutrality issues.

"The Commission should reject Level 3's efforts to upset the
well-functioning and pro-consumer marketplace that exists today by interjecting
regulatory involvement in place of true, market-based negotiations for
interconnection of networks," Ian Dillner, Verizon's vice president of
federal regulatory affairs, wrote said in an ex parte filing Thursday with the FCC.

Level 3 has argued that the FCC's Open Internet Order, adopted by the agency
Dec. 21, forbids Comcast and other retail broadband providers from charging a
fee to deliver content to their customers. Level 3, which picked its fight with
Comcast after landing a contract as one of Netflix's primary content delivery
network providers, is considering
challenging Comcast on network-neutrality grounds.